Huang Qiaoling was short more than 29 million yuan (US$3.5 million) of the 30 million yuan he needed to start the tourist and entertainment business he had envisioned.
So, as with most of China's entrepreneurs, the son of a farmer from China's eastern Zhejiang province was forced to begin by borrowing the start-up capital from friends in 1994.
Eight years later, from inside the oval office of his million-dollar Washington White House replica in the eastern city of Hangzhou, Huang rules over the Song Dynasty Town Group, a Disneyland-like empire worth 4 billion yuan.
The self-made entrepreneur is testament to market forces at work in China's fast-changing economy and the growing role of private enterprise in an increasingly affluent and modern nation.
Official statistics show private firms contributed 27 percent of China's 9.5 trillion yuan (US$1.1 trillion) gross domestic product last year, becoming a major engine of economic growth as well as bringing hope it will relieve the nation's massive joblessness.
Yet despite the clear paradigm shift in China's centrally dictated economic policies, getting a business of the ground remains a murky process which requires navigating a web of personal and political relationships and deals as complex as they are risky.
For hopeful entrepreneurs, the avenues to the acquisition of seed capital remain restricted, and those who are fortunate enough to have wealthy family and friends usually turn to them.
Other than personal favours, to begin a business independently needs approaching another firm with a good business plan or finding one of a handful of the country's venture capital firms, said China Europe International Business School management professor Zhang Weijiong.
Securing a government-sponsored incubator plan is another way, but that also requires capital.
Starting a business is very difficult without assets confirmed Huang, 44, whose group is made up of 20 tourist-related businesses in the eastern cities of Hangzhou, Nanjing and Ningbo and northeastern Dalian.
His own path to super-wealth could barely have begun in a more complex way, and Huang swears he would never choose to launch a business again.
It started with a 10 million yuan loan from friends. Huang promised to pay back borrowings with accruing annual interest rates of 20 percent.
He then persuaded a construction company to begin building hundreds of acres of an amusement park that include models of Amsterdam, Venice and ancient China streets without a down payment, promising 20 percent annual interest until the project was completed.
As building began, Huang insured the project at a value of 20 million yuan. That contractual agreement allowed him to borrow an additional 10 million yuan from banks.
Finally Huang asked a friend in Hong Kong to deposit 10 million yuan in a local bank and used that deposit as a guarantee on the next 10 million loan.
Such means were not an option for Shanghai's Yellow Submarine pizza chain co-owner Wu Dingming who sunk all his cash with an American business partner into his first pizza shop in 1994.
"It was not a big amount of money, but I was lucky that many foreigners came to my restaurant on the first day of business," he said.
"In China private business has little access to bank loans."
Ye Enguo, general secretary of the quasi-governmental Shanghai Private Enterprise Association explained that acquiring capital for a new business is an obstacle for many entrepreneurs.
"Currently, private firms still have problems borrowing money from banks. One reason is because Shanghai has not set up a reliable credit network," he said.
Intel Corp chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) is expected to meet with Taiwanese suppliers next month in conjunction with the opening of the Computex Taipei trade show, supply chain sources said on Monday. The visit, the first for Tan to Taiwan since assuming his new post last month, would be aimed at enhancing Intel’s ties with suppliers in Taiwan as he attempts to help turn around the struggling US chipmaker, the sources said. Tan is to hold a banquet to celebrate Intel’s 40-year presence in Taiwan before Computex opens on May 20 and invite dozens of Taiwanese suppliers to exchange views
Application-specific integrated circuit designer Faraday Technology Corp (智原) yesterday said that although revenue this quarter would decline 30 percent from last quarter, it retained its full-year forecast of revenue growth of 100 percent. The company attributed the quarterly drop to a slowdown in customers’ production of chips using Faraday’s advanced packaging technology. The company is still confident about its revenue growth this year, given its strong “design-win” — or the projects it won to help customers design their chips, Faraday president Steve Wang (王國雍) told an online earnings conference. “The design-win this year is better than we expected. We believe we will win
Chizuko Kimura has become the first female sushi chef in the world to win a Michelin star, fulfilling a promise she made to her dying husband to continue his legacy. The 54-year-old Japanese chef regained the Michelin star her late husband, Shunei Kimura, won three years ago for their Sushi Shunei restaurant in Paris. For Shunei Kimura, the star was a dream come true. However, the joy was short-lived. He died from cancer just three months later in June 2022. He was 65. The following year, the restaurant in the heart of Montmartre lost its star rating. Chizuko Kimura insisted that the new star is still down
While China’s leaders use their economic and political might to fight US President Donald Trump’s trade war “to the end,” its army of social media soldiers are embarking on a more humorous campaign online. Trump’s tariff blitz has seen Washington and Beijing impose eye-watering duties on imports from the other, fanning a standoff between the economic superpowers that has sparked global recession fears and sent markets into a tailspin. Trump says his policy is a response to years of being “ripped off” by other countries and aims to bring manufacturing to the US, forcing companies to employ US workers. However, China’s online warriors